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You no doubt have an asset list, either stored mentally or written down somewhere, that documents all the machines and accounts in your care. This list will be essential for your \u201cIn Case of Emergency\u201d kit. Be sure to include all<\/i> devices (don\u2019t forget oft-ignored things like admin accounts for your modem and router), email accounts, utilities like power and water, financial institutions, cloud services, and any servers you might be hosting for other people.<\/p>\n Now that you have your asset list, choose an emergency contact. This person will be entrusted to take care of all your digital assets, and can be a family member or friend, or someone official like a lawyer.<\/p>\n If you have already written your will, you\u2019ll likely have already chosen an executor to find and manage your assets. Some online services \u2013 like Google<\/a>, Facebook<\/a> and Instagram<\/a> \u2013 allow you to designate an emergency or legacy contact who can administer your accounts. Many password manager applications allow you to set an emergency contact too (which can also be helpful in less dire situations, if you ever need to reset a lost master password).<\/p>\n This is the point where you need to exercise a little extra caution, so as to avoid making security slip-ups. Create a list of your usernames and passwords, and create backup codes for any accounts that have two-factor authentication enabled.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you keep a digital copy of your credentials, be sure to encrypt it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n To protect this list, there are a few things you can do. You can keep a copy on paper or removable media locked away somewhere, such as in a fire safe or safety deposit box. You can entrust it to a lawyer, or sign up for an end-of-life planning service<\/a>.<\/p>\n Keep in mind that law firms and companies can and do go out of business, so you may still want to keep an additional form of backup. Be sure to ask them questions about their security too, as losing this much sensitive information at once would inevitably be a massive pain to fix.<\/p>\n If you keep a digital copy of your credentials, be sure to encrypt it. Public-key encryption<\/a> is a natural choice for this situation, but you may need to be aware of expiration dates. And keep in mind that storage media degrades over long periods of time, so every five or ten years you should move your information to a new disk.<\/p>\n We\u2019ve all been through a fire drill or other preparedness training at least once in our lives, so we understand the idea that they\u2019re meant to help us act swiftly and sanely even when our emotions are running high.<\/p>\nAuthorization<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Backups<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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<\/p>\nPreparedness drills<\/strong><\/h2>\n